Zero Break by Neil S Plakcy

Author:Neil S Plakcy [Plakcy, Neil S]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: gay romance
Publisher: Samwise Books
Published: 2019-08-19T05:00:00+00:00

Numbers Don’t

Our phone rang off and on that night. Everybody I knew was shaken up by what had happened at Chinatown Christian Academy. You couldn’t turn on the TV without seeing the police moving around the school, and the story took up most of the front page of the Star-Advertiser. My family was horrified, and my sister-in-law Liliha was one of many parents who planned to go to Punahou to demand an audience with the principal about security measures.

Harry and Arleen had considered sending Brandon to Chinatown Christian, and they were filled with relief that they had decided against it. The only person I didn’t hear from was Terri, and that was because she was skiing in Idaho with her son Danny, and with Levi and his daughter.

The mood at headquarters was somber the next morning. Everybody wanted to talk about Randy Tsutsui, about why he had done what he had. Theories abounded. He had been an abused child. He had been bullied. No, he was a bully himself. Why had he been allowed to keep the gun his father committed suicide with? Had there been any warning signs that he was unbalanced?

No one had any answers, but everyone had a theory. We were listening to Gary Saunders bluster about something when my cell rang. “Detective? My name is Ellen Toyama. You called me?”

I explained that we were investigating Zoë Greenfield’s murder, and she said, “Fo’ real? Like on TV?”

“Yeah, we’re for real,” I said. “Can we talk to you?”

“I’m on my way to work?” The way she raised her voice at the end of the sentence made it sound like a question, one I didn’t have an answer for.

“Where do you work?”

“At the Old Navy in Ala Moana Center?”

“If we come over there, you think you can take a break and talk to us?”

“My boss loves Hawai’i Five-O,” she said. “I’m sure she’d let me take break.”

Finally, a sentence that didn’t sound like a question.

I told her we’d be there in a half hour or so. Ray and I were glad to get out of the station and the gloom that pervaded it after the events of the day before.

We parked at the far end of the mall, near Sears, and waited until a bus had disgorged a horde of tourists heading for the Hilo Hattie store next door before we could go inside, where Hapa was singing “Lei Pikake” over the sound system. Ellen Toyama was an elf of a girl, only about five feet tall, with short dark hair and a perpetual smile. I wondered if Zoë had known any women who weren’t Asian.

Ellen got permission from her boss to take a break, and we walked out into the center of the mall. We bypassed a convention of moms and strollers to find a quiet corner. “You knew Zoë Greenfield?” I asked.

She nodded. “We met at this girls night out party?” she said. “Like a year ago?” She pulled a package of gum from her pocket and offered us sticks.

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